


Rose Colored Boy

by JaneAire



Category: The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Roommates/Housemates, Body Image, Coming Out, Friends to Lovers, Jealousy, M/M, Pining, Platonic Cuddling, Size Difference, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-13
Updated: 2018-10-12
Packaged: 2019-08-01 05:49:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16278944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JaneAire/pseuds/JaneAire
Summary: Runaan's roommate was never anything he expected him to be--loud, occasionally irresponsible, soft, affectionate, beautiful without knowing it--He was also a linguistics major at the university Runaan GA's at.Most importantly, Runaan was definitely, absolutely, not in love with him.





	Rose Colored Boy

**Author's Note:**

> Housekeeping bc archive still won't let me put notes in the tags:   
> ☆ Who is canon I don't know her  
> ☆ I write vignette style. Enjoy modernist style with English poetry verbosity Idk what to tell Y'all lol  
> ☆ I haven't decided if I'm keeping the canon age gap (Gren as 25 and Runaan as 35ish) but Gren is an undergrad and Runaan is a grad student.  
> ☆ Runaan is gonna cuss like a sailor and Gren is gonna say frick frank snick snack bc he's a good boy  
> ☆ Gren is also plus size bc I'm in charge Deal With It  
> ☆ I gave them fake last names idk  
> ☆ This whole first chapter smells like exposition in the morning   
> ☆ Enjoy your meal bone ape tit

Runaan could hardly be bothered to look up from his novel when he heard the key slide into the apartment's lock. There was no need for verification; he knew exactly who was expected, and, against his wishes, his pulse jumped in his throat as if his body thought he was owed something. 

Still, his eyes darted up to glance at the clock below the television, blinking a mocking _1:24 am_ at him in the dim lights. He should've been in bed hours ago--it was bloody midterms week for goodness sake--but he supposed life may have been easier for linguistics majors. 

He knew that wasn't true, of course. He'd seen the piles of homework on their goodwill kitchen table, half rickety due to one leg being shorter than the others. His roommate rocked it with absent eyes every morning as they chewed their breakfast in silent lethargy, and every morning Runaan chided him to stop in a biting tone. He'd seen his roommate have near meltdowns over the paperwork, over letters of the alphabet that looked like gibberish, and nothing like Runaan’s own rudimentary knowledge of his own Lowland Scots. 

It had nothing to do with the fact linguistics majors weren't busy--the calendar on the fridge revealed his roommate had two midterms the day after next within minutes of each other. No, it had nothing to do with actual responsibilities. 

It had everything to do with _Gren_. 

Gren, who Runaan was absolutely not waiting up for. 

“Can't you bring him home at a reasonable hour?” Runaan sighed, before wincing in realization that he actually needed to stand and greet his guest so that she could read his lips. 

Sure enough, Amaya was stomping in on shaking legs, looking far too smug for someone carrying two hundred pounds of dead weight bridal style in her arms. 

Gren wasn't unconscious, yet, but the strawberry hue to his cheeks had increased tenfold from the alcohol consumption. He was giggling uncontrollably against the column of Amaya’s throat--Runaan had to swallow against the bitter chord of jealousy snaking up his own--until she dumped him over the back of the couch. 

Runaan repeated the question with a cross countenance, arms folded across his chest, hoping he looked menacing in his purple silk pajamas and hair clipped and tied back away from his face. Visible from here, Gren’s own face was smudged with eyeliner across his cheeks, his sweater stained at the collar with what he hoped was vodka and not a bodily fluid--the smell left it ambiguous, unfortunately. 

Amaya shrugged, before gesturing a goodbye before Runaan could even ask if she were alright to walk back to her apartment alone. 

Ridiculous, he knew, but better to be gentlemanly than not. 

He would've succeeded in that if his bloody translator wasn't nearly out cold. 

“ _Ruuunniii_ ,” a voice crooned, mouth pressed flush to the pleather of their love seat, and pale hands with flush knuckles shot into the air, grabbing like a toddler. “Come here, please.” 

“Absolutely not,” Runaan hissed, stepped out of arms length and crossing strides into the kitchenette, small, but nice enough for its purposes. Runaan's parents funded the apartment almost entirely--a suffocating fact in and of itself--but it made pouring Gren cold water that he'd actually drink to avoid dying of alcohol poisoning in the middle of their living room. 

“Runi,” Gren pouted, followed by a series of grunts and groans, the couch screaming in protest that had the back of Runaan's neck go warm, until he realized Gren was just turning to lay on his back, flushed, soft knuckles folded lovely across his stomach, absently stroking across the downy fabric of his green sweater. 

Yes, Runaan knew he was a petulant moron when he was drinking. He was also lethally pretty. 

“Just wanna cuddle,” he pouted, lips red from what Runaan should safely imagine as the cold air outside, October casting a sweet glow about his early autumn roommate, but instead his tired brain concocted less innocent imagery.

The alcohol flushing across his whole skin, his awful oral fixation constantly leaving him chewing and sucking on the neck of his shitty microbrew beer, leaving his mouth tasting like soured green apples and wheat. Maybe the alcohol had given the ever charismatic Gren enough energy to go clubbing--Amaya hated it, Runaan knew from Gren’s chatter mouth, but Gren enjoyed the pulsing beat of the music and strange hands on him. Maybe Gren had been dancing, lips suddenly on a consenting strangers neck. Maybe they'd been kissing. Maybe they'd snuck off to the bathroom and--

Gren’s flushed hand brushed his, plush and soft, calloused at his fingertips, taking the water glass in a shaking grip. 

“Thanks, Mom,” he grinned cheekily, poking his pink tongue out that made Runaan look away. 

He shouldn't be doing this. He should stop himself from thinking.

Runaan rose to stand nearer to the kitchenette, safer, there, away from Gren’s always hungry wandering hands.

It wasn't Gren’s fault he was a cuddler when he was drunk--it was Runaan's fault for having the world’s most inappropriate _feelings_ for him. 

He'd get over it. He had to. Gren was too good a friend to lose to him to something as inane as the fact that Runaan couldn't stop thinking about kissing him whenever they were sitting beside each other on the couch watching netflix. 

Still, Gren struggled into a sitting position, and gave Runaan a moony smile. 

“You seem knackered in the best way,” Runaan said, stomach curling in on itself when his own face blossomed with an involuntary smile. Gren mirrored it back, all soft skin and pollen dust freckles, yellow and rose. “I take it the night went well, then? Meet any good lads?”

Gren sat up farther, those red lips slick and eyes hazy, seeming to be his excitable self, ready to amble off the list of all the boys whose fingers had touched his hips, boys Runaan wanted to kick off the planet for touching him--

Gren sat up, and his expression shifted from giddy to a soft, childlike confusion. Runaan stared. 

“Alright, mate?”

He was not. 

Runaan was thankful vomit was easy to clean off leather. 

\----

Gren was done with his shower by the time the dryer had kicked off and Runaan's own hands reeked raw of Clorox, the pads of his fingers puffed and pruned from the liquid. The apartment, at least, had survived the worst of Gren’s night out. 

Struggling to pull a sweatshirt on over his boxers, however, it was evident Gren had not. 

Their shared bathroom was steamed with the heat from the shower, mirrors thankfully fogged. He didn't need Gren’s swimming eyes to make out the smudged eyeliner still residued on his own cheeks, arms twisted over his head. 

He also didn't want to risk Gren glimpsing what Runaan knew to be a soft and reverent expression on his own face, gazing at inebriated Gren as if he were a puppy tearing up his favorite sweatshirt. Which, in a way, he kind of was. 

“Grendaline,” Runaan called in his best mothering tone, leaned against the door jamb, only to find wide and embarrassed eyes on him. “That's my sweatshirt, _dear_.” 

He’d meant it as a joke, but he regretted it the second the words left his lips, watching Gren tear the thing off over his head and press it against his chest, cheeks suddenly molten under his constellation cheeks. 

“Frick, uh, sorry, Runi, uh--” 

“You can wear, if you'd like,” Runaan said, swearing at himself again. 

They both knew he couldn't bloody wear it. It certainly wasn't Gren’s fault he just happened to be a few sizes bigger than Runaan, stomach and thighs soft, visible now in just powder blue boxers--a sight Runaan had seen again and again and refused to enjoy. He was guilty enough in being emotionally attracted to the man. He wouldn't be perverse as well.

Gren certainly, in Runaan's opinion, shouldn't feel any sort of bad for being soft. He was still inordinately strong, lifting with Amaya every other day of the week, but even if he hadn't been--

Well, Runaan certainly thought he was handsome. 

Not in a weird, fetishy kind of way, or anything! Bloody, wouldn't that be the worst of it--

Gren was staring at him, which made Runaan realize he'd been staring, and, fuck, cut his embarrassed gaze back down to the floor. 

Gren wobbled by the sink, still holding Runaan's sweatshirt to his chest, mumbling, “I'll go grab a--”

“I'll get it! I'll get it--promise me you won't crack your head open?” 

Gren smiled, soft, almost like himself again. 

Runaan was thankful that the alcohol would knock him out soon, and put them both out of this misery. 

\----

“‘M sorry you're always cleanin’ up after me,” Gren slurred as he got dressed, pulling a maroon hoodie on over his head and sliding down into bed, eyes half lidded, a little bloodshot and glassy. Sleep would take him soon. 

“Yes, well, what are roommates for?” Runaan huffed a laugh. 

He knew what Gren would say to that, what he always said, but Runaan couldn't quite bring himself to tongue up the word _friend_. Sure, they'd been roommates for nearly three semesters now, but it was rare of them to spend time together outside of the four walls that confined them. And granted, Runaan knew the name of every ragged stuffed animal of his piled on the corner of his bed, could name the song off every album of every band poster he had tapped to his walls with ripped corners. Gren may have been the closest thing to a real friend Runaan had outside of colleagues and his niece, but that didn't make them real friends. 

Runaan wasn't pathetic enough to assume so, even if all he thought about at night was Gren waking up chipper the next morning and pressing a chaste kiss at the corners of his mouth before darting off to class. 

It was the domestic thrill that idled his brain, made his fingers twitch. 

Gren didn't hesitate to sit up--again, too quickly, stunning him for a moment--before reaching up to prod Runaan in the face with a harsh finger. 

“Say _friend,_ dude,” Gren grumped, pouting with those still swollen lips that matched the mottled color spots springing up his drunken neck. It really wasn't fair that he was so pretty when he was drunk, when Runaan felt guiltiest of all. “Anyone who cleans up my ralph is a friend.” 

Runaan's stomach twisted. Friends didn't really keep nasty, wrong, nonconsensual crushes on their roommate a secret, now did they? Friends didn't get crushes on friends. There were millions of sitcoms on why that was so wrong, and Gren had always hated Ross Geller. Runaan refused to be him. 

“Sleep off your hangover. You've got an exam tomorrow, haven't you?” 

“You tell me, _Professor._ ”

Runaan cringed. “I've asked you kindly not to call me that.” 

Gren chuckled good naturedly, burrowing down under his quilt. “Sorry. It just makes you all squirmy--too worth it, dude.” 

“Yes, well, it's _dude_ here, but I do expect Mr. Arden when I'm subbing your class again.” 

A horrific experience Runaan would never like to relive. Being a GA was difficult enough on its good days--waltzing into a poetry class, getting ready to teach Sidney and Donne, no less, only to find Gren and Amaya chortling in the back row, making googly eyes at him during his lecture? He'd asked for a specific list of Gren’s schedule after that and made sure to turn down and feign sick for any other openings. The boy was menace. 

“Sir, yes, sir.” 

Runaan definitely didn't smile back at him. 

Or maybe he did. It wasn't as if Gren would remember it in the morning. 

\----

“You should sleep in here tonight.” 

Runaan froze as he tucked Gren’s newly washed sweater into his dresser. Half of his mind was screaming, all canons going off, and yet, what was the hope for? 

“I most certainly should not,” Runaan huffed, voice deeper than he intended it to be. 

Even on the wild off chance that Gren would make a move on him--wild, not just improbable, but utterly impossible--Runaan could never accept it while Gren was this drunk. And while he'd sobered up a little in the fewer hours they'd been home, it wasn't near enough to accept any kind of consent. 

That was all hypothetical, of course. 

Gren pouted those lips of his, rose petal and plush, just like the rest of him. “Just to cuddle. I know it's cold in your room, too, Runi.” 

So, maybe they had cuddled from time to time. Sue him. It wasn't his fault Gren loved it so bloody much. 

It was just his fault for enjoying it. 

“You're drunk, Gren. Go to sleep.”

“Boo, you whore,” Gren harrumphed, rolling over in the bed with his back to Runaan. “It's just _cuddling._ I'm not gonna jump you.” 

Runaan sighed. He was being punished, surely, by the gods of friendship, who had always wanted Runaan to die cold and alone like the utter dick he was. 

“I mean--” Gren continued, voice suddenly unsure. “I'm not--I'm not gonna make you, either. That's--only if you want to. I know I threw up on your couch and stretched out your sweatshirt and made an idiot of myself but, like, don't _not_ cuddle just because you think I don't want--”

“For a linguistics major, you have terrible word economy,” Runaan laughed, smile slim. “But I'm not cuddling you while you're drunk. You won't even remember this in the morning.” 

“You just wanna cuddle my socks off when I'm sober,” Gren teased, reaching out for a little rabbit plush sitting by the bed, it's ears long chewed off by a child with different teeth than the boy before him. 

Putting aside their friendship, their relationship academically, their relationship in regards to co-renting the apartment--Runaan could never deserve someone like Gren. He was too _good._ Runaan couldn't be angry with those boys at the bar, not really, not when they could give Gren all the things Runaan couldn't. 

Bloody hell, he was how much older and he wasn't even out of closet. To anyone. 

Gren deserved miles better than that. 

“Something like that,” Runaan agreed with a sad smile Gren wouldn't remember in the morning. “I'll see you at exams?” 

“Wake me up, please?”

Runaan snorted. “Someone has to make sure you haven't swallowed your tongue.” 

\----

By the time Runaan laid down for bed, it was nearly time to be awake, and the tiredness had long since replaced itself with anxiety that not even Donne’s elegies could will away. 

He was a villain, then, after a virtue he'd never deserve. It was for the best, after all. He'd never proved to be a lover. 

\----

It wasn't Runaan's fault that Gren had been nothing what he'd expected when he'd taken roommate applications. A sporty, cheery linguistics major--a lover of words, like him--who was a bit juvenile for his age. Soft, strong, rose and honey with art speck blemishes across all his wildflower skin. 

It wasn't Runaan's fault that Gren was more open, annoying, and kind than anyone that had occupied that room before him. 

It wasn't Runaan's fault that, for some reason, Gren cared about learning the meaning behind Runaan's shitty Shakespeare jokes and let them cuddle on the couch, watching Runaan's favorite docuseries and Gren’s silly animated musicals till one of them fell asleep. 

It wasn't Runaan's fault that Gren used lemon soap in the mornings, and it lingered in the kitchen long after he'd turned on the coffee pot. Gren didn't even drink coffee--he turned it on just for Runaan. 

It wasn't Runaan's fault that Gren was beautiful and distracting and so tactile with his friendly affection, cuddles and hugs and grabbing onto his arm during the scary parts of films Gren had picked out himself.

It wasn't Runaan's fault. It certainly wasn't Gren’s, who'd never done anything wrong. Not here, not to Runaan, not ever. It wasn't their fault. 

It was, however, Runaan's fault for falling horribly, tragically, painfully in love with him. 

He almost laughed to think it, laying in bed, hands folded across his chest, thinking about how Gren had laid with hair disheveled and lips wet quite the same way. Still, it came to his useless brain all the same, cliche and stupid, just like him: _something was definitely rotten in Denmark._

**Author's Note:**

> Someone laugh at Runaan's shitty Shakespeare jokes or he's going to die alone.
> 
> Thanks for reading ♡


End file.
